Set up Copilot Variance Analysis

Copilot Variance Analysis alerts budget owners and finance leaders when actual spending exceeds the budget. Copilot notifications keep budget owners in the loop, whether it’s a timely update or an on-demand review. You can drill into report insights to see detailed breakdowns and visualizations that show exactly how your budget is doing.

Before you can set up Copilot Variance Analysis

The following sections describe the setup tasks required before configuring Copilot Variance Analysis:

You can configure Copilot Variance Analysis to compare your actual data against 1 budget that exists in Sage Intacct. If you have multiple budgets, the best practice is to use your operational budget that includes approved budget data.

The following are the budget requirements:

  • The budget must be created at the top level.
  • The budget must include all entities that you want to track.
  • The budget cannot be configured as a consolidated budget.
  • The budget should include a budget line for each GL account/budget reporting period/dimension combination that you want to track. If there is no corresponding budget detail, Copilot will assume the budget amount is zero.

Learn how to add a budget.

Copilot Variance Analysis uses the following account groups to analyze variance data:

  • Net operating income
  • Revenue
  • Cost of revenue (if applicable)
  • Operating expenses

The names of the account groups you want to use for these account groups may differ. The following are the account group requirements:

  • All of the GL accounts in the account groups you want to use must have Account type = Income statement account.
  • The Net operating income account group must contain the same GL accounts that are included in the Revenue, Cost of revenue, and Operating expenses account groups.

If your company was created using a QuickStart template, you should have existing account groups that you can use to set up Variance Analysis.

To find out if your company was created using a QuickStart template, look on the Accounting tab of Company info (Company > Setup > Configuration > Company). If a template was used, the type appears under Setup template. If the field is blank, the company was not set up using a template.

The table below lists these account groups based on the type of QuickStart template that was used.

QuickStart account groups

QuickStart template

Net operating income

Revenue

Cost of revenue

Operating expenses

Note

Services

Operating Net Income

Revenue

Cost of Revenue

Operating Expense

Does not include non-operating expenses.

General

Operating Net Income

Revenue

Cost of Revenue

Operating Expenses

Does not include non-operating expenses.

Nonprofit

Net Surplus (Deficit)

Revenues

N/A

Expenditures

 

Learn how to view GL accounts and account groups.

This step is required only if your company has multi-base currencies enabled. You'll need to select one or more entity groups that share the same base currency on the Configure Copilot Variance Analysis page.

Your Variance Analysis insights will be based on the groups that you select.

Create a location group that contains the applicable entities. See Create a location group for more information.

When you create the group, select All members as the Group type and add the following filter: 

  • Field = Base currency

  • Operator = Equals

  • Value = The applicable currency

By filtering for the base currency, you avoid the need to update the list if you add a new entity with the same currency.

Decide which financial report that you want to run for each dimensional analysis. For example, if you only want to analyze by department, use a financial report with rows structured by department.

The financial report must include the following to align with data presented in Copilot insights:

  • Actuals for the current year to date (YTD) or current fiscal year to date (FYTD)
  • Budget for the current YTD or current FYTD
  • Actuals for the prior YTD or prior FYTD

If your company was created using any of the QuickStart templates, you can install one of the Variance analysis reports from the QuickStart library. For more information, see About the Variance analysis report.

Users will be able to launch the financial report directly from Copilot to investigate details on a reported variance. Note the following expected behavior when launching a financial report from Copilot:

  • If the financial report is set up with prompts, you'll need to enter the prompts before viewing the report.
  • If you choose to analyze by department and also by location or entity, Copilot will launch the location or entity financial report by default for unrestricted users (users who have access to financial information for the entire organization).

Copilot can analyze your budget by department or by location or entity. While you can choose to analyze by department and also by location or entity, Copilot will not analyze by the intersection of these dimensions. For example, Copilot can analyze expenses for the sales department and it can analyze expenses for the New York location, but it cannot analyze expenses for the sales department in the New York location.

Copilot sends Variance Analysis notifications to:

  • Budget managers identified as the department, entity, or location manager when operating expense actuals exceed budget for the applicable business unit.
  • Finance leaders identified as an unrestricted user. An unrestricted user is someone who will have access to budget and actual information for the entire organization, like a controller or CFO. Your environment can include one unrestricted user or a group of unrestricted users.

To be eligible to receive Copilot Variance Analysis notifications, a dimension manager or unrestricted user must have:

  • An employee record (dimension manager only). The employee record must be associated with the applicable user record.
  • A user record with a Business or Employee user type.

Learn how to add employees and users.

Assign managers to dimensions

A manager must be specified on each dimension record for the appropriate budget owner to receive dimension-level notifications. Depending on which dimensions you use for variance analysis, you'll need to assign managers to departments, locations, or entities based on how your organization manages the budget.

You company's approval process might also use the manager specified on a dimension. See your Intacct administrator before changing an existing dimension manager.

  1. Do one of the following:
    • Go to Reports > Setup > Dimensions and select Departments.
    • Go to Reports > Setup > Dimensions and select Locations.
    • Go to Company > Setup > Configuration and select Entities.
  2. In the applicable dimension list, select Edit next to the desired dimension.
  3. Use the Manager dropdown list to select the desired manager.

    If you do not see the desired manager in the dropdown list, ensure there's an employee record for the manager.

  4. Save the record.
Optionally, Create a group of unrestricted users

When you configure Copilot Variance Analysis, you can specify an individual unrestricted user or a group of unrestricted users to which Copilot will send notifications. Unrestricted users will have access to all budget and actual information for your organization. Follow your internal business processes to determine who should have access to this data.

A user who is restricted to certain departments or locations cannot be a member of this unrestricted users group.

Learn how to create a user group.

Enable scheduled jobs

For notifications to work, you must enable Scheduled jobs in Company information.

  1. Go to Company > Setup > Configuration, and select Company.

  2. On the General information tab, find the Global settings section.

  3. In the Scheduled jobs field, select On.

  4. Select Save.

Set up Copilot Variance Analysis

Complete the following tasks to set up and configure Copilot Variance Analysis:

Sage Intacct administrators can subscribe to Copilot Variance Analysis.

  1. Go to Company > Admin > Subscriptions and select the toggle to subscribe to Sage Intacct Close Automation.
  2. Select Configure.
  3. Select Enable Variance Analysis.
  4. Select Save.

After you subscribe to Copilot Variance Analysis, complete the configuration options found in the Budgets application.

  1. Go to Budgets > Setup > Configuration and select Copilot Variance Analysis.

    The Configure Copilot Variance Analysis page appears.

  2. Use the Budget dropdown list to select the applicable budget.
  3. If your company's accounting method is Cash and Accrual, use the Reporting book dropdown to select either the Cash or Accrual reporting book. Otherwise, this field defaults to Accrual or Cash as applicable.
  4. If you want to include other reporting books in the variance analysis, select the applicable Other books.
  5. Do one of the following:
    • If you didn't select any other books, or if you did select other books and want to analyze data from both the main reporting books and the selected other books, select the Combine reporting book with other books checkbox.
    • If you did select other books and want to analyze data using only the other books, leave the checkbox blank. This is not common.
  6. In the Budget insights account groups section, use the dropdown lists to select the Net operating income, Revenue, Cost of revenue, and Operating expenses account groups you identified earlier.
  7. In the Analyze by section, do the following:

    • If your company has multi-base currencies enabled, select the entity groups that you want to include in the Variance Analysis insights.

      Only entity groups that share the same base currency are available to select in Variance Analysis. You can select up to 10 entity groups.

    • If you want to analyze budget data by location or entity, select the Location or entity checkbox and then select a Location or entity financial report.
    • If you want to analyze budget data by department, select the Department checkbox and then select a Department financial report.

    If you already have a financial report that shows budget variances by the location or entity or the department, select that report in the applicable dropdown list.

    If you don't already have a report, and your company was created using a QuickStart template, you can install one the Variance analysis reports from the QuickStart library.

    For more information, see QuickStart library: financial report templates.

  8. If you want to receive email notifications, select the Email checkbox in the Notify channels section.
  9. In the Notify when section, select the Operating expense actuals exceed budget checkbox, and then select the applicable Frequency. For example, if you select Weekly, the applicable dimension managers and unrestricted users will be notified when expenses exceed budget on a weekly basis.
  10. In the Notify whom section, you must select at least one user or user group to notify.
    1. Select the applicable dimension managers checkbox. For example, if you selected to analyze by Department, select Department managers.
    2. Select an unrestricted user or user group.

      The unrestricted user or user group members are typically controllers, directors of finance, and so forth. They’ll receive insights related to variance analysis data for your entire organization.

      • To send insights to one unrestricted user, select the Unrestricted user checkbox. Then use the dropdown list to select the user.
      • To send insights to a group of users, select the Unrestricted user group checkbox. Then use the dropdown list to select the user group.
    To run Variance Analysis, users must meet one of the following criteria:
    • They must be the unrestricted user or a member of the unrestricted user group.
    • If you're analyzing by location or department, they must be a location or department manager.
  11. Save the configuration.

All dimension managers and unrestricted users need the following permissions to use Copilot Variance Analysis:

  • Sage Intacct Close Automation: Variance analysis—Run
  • General Ledger: Reports: Financials—View
  • General Ledger: Drill down to all transactions from reports—Enable
If a user has permission to drill down to all transactions from reports, they can drill down to view the Dimension Balances report, even if they do not have permissions to the report. However, they cannot customize the report. The Dimension Balances report permissions are inherited from the Trial Balance report permissions.

Learn how to assign user and role permissions.

Additionally, users need access rights to the financial reports you specified in the configuration. If your company denies financial report access to everyone by default, use the Permissions tab in the financials report to grant access to the applicable users.

Learn about financial report level permissions.